Endless Night (Fate's Intent Book 3) (5 page)

I only sighed to it. “You know that won’t work.”

“They’ll be staying here.” Adele said. “It’ll be fine. Now, excuse me. I still have to get this on.” She stepped inside her closet with her dress in hand and closed the door behind her.

I just stared at the door with Troy’s arm still tightly in mine like I wasn’t going to be willing to let go. There was no way I was comfortable leaving him here. The last time I left him, we were apart for almost two weeks and I thought he would have been gone forever.

“It’s okay.” Troy whispered. “You have to go and we’ll be right here when you get back.”

I looked up at him, my head shaking and voice skipping beats. “I—I can’t leave you. No. I—I won’t.”

“I’ll be fine. It won’t be that long this time.”

I knew I wasn’t going to have a choice. Adele wouldn’t consider any other option if there even were one. If she was going, I was going and if I was going, Troy had to stay. It would be safer for him but I didn’t want to leave him. I wanted to keep him with me always. Our days apart were dreadfully painful for me. I didn’t want to think I didn’t mean anything to him. I knew I did and now I know that for sure. He came for me and I loved him.

I pressed my cheek close to him and wanted to savor the minutes we had left. I knew I would see him soon but I still didn’t want this to end.

“Ruby!”

Adele shouted from inside her closet and Ruby looked over at me with a wide grin.

“You didn’t show her the dress?” I asked.

“I got a little distracted.”

“In here! Now!”

Ruby jumped to her words and stepped away from Darius to tend to Adele.

“Is it bad?” Zayden asked.

I laughed. “No but Adele still hates everything.”

“Careful! I need to breathe!”

“Breathing is unimportant.” Ruby replied. “Hold still.”

We heard Adele take a deep intake of air like she was suffocating but it was more amusing to me. I wasn’t worried. I knew she would look amazing when she stepped out.

The door opened and Ruby was guiding her out while she had a hand at her ribcage. “I’m going to kill him for this.”

She could hate it all she wanted but she still looked great. Her dress was black and obviously tight fitting like a corset at the top with a high square-like neckline. The rest of it hugged her till about her knee where it then flared out with a train. It was made out of this unique hand knitted material that probably took someone months to make and it sparkled with every move she made.

Zayden was just staring at her with gratitude. “You look beautiful.”

“Are you kidding me? This silhouette is doing all the wrong things for my hips.”

She looked in the large mirror on the wall and Zayden approached, naturally taking up the place next to her. “I wouldn’t say that. We look great together.”

“Get away from me.” Adele shoved him away while he laughed. “You make me look bland.”

“That’s not true but it’s too bad I can’t go with you so I could look at it some more.”

“I don’t need an escort.”

I looked right at Ruby with full intent to hold my tongue but Adele caught it. She looked between us with that face like she was ready to get it out of us no matter what. “What was that?”

I shook my head but Ruby ignored it and laughed inconspicuously. “Funny that you should say escort. Your father picked the dress based on who he chose to walk in with you.”

Ruby took out the accessory from the bag that was like a black sheer cape with black feathers on it that would attach to the back of the dress. This was more of a costume event after all but Adele still wasn’t happy when she figured it out. “Oh, no. No way.”

“Sorry.” I smiled, feeling bad that it was true.

“But Kole? Why?”

I shrugged, trying to keep as normal as possible while Ruby began to attach it to her dress. “The usual thing. You know your father is protective. Other guys see you walk in with Kole, they’ll leave you alone.”

“That’s stupid.”

“Well, it works. People are afraid of him.”

“Because he’s scary.” Ruby whispered.

I laughed and I don’t know why but I just said it. “In a respectable way. No one’s ever bothered me.”

Adele rolled her eyes. “No one ever bothers you because if they even think about touching you, Trever has their life significantly shortened on the spot. How is Kole involved?”

“He’s the one that does the shortening.” Ruby whispered again. “There. It looks nice.”

“Great.” Adele grumbled, looking in the mirror again.

“Well, I think considering the circumstance, it’ll be good for all of us that he’s taking you.” I said.

“How would that be good for us?”

“Think about it. Kole hates these things just as much as you and having to drag you there will be a perfect cover.”

“Cover?”

“Yeah. You’ll be able to distract Kole. He’s ultimately the one person that we don’t want being near them right now. You may think it’s your father but you’d be wrong. They’ve gotten through him once, they could do it again.”

“That’s nice. We’re not encouraging that.”

“And you don’t think we could go through Kole just as easily?” Zayden asked.

Ruby laughed. “You’re brave, Zayden but it seems Adele didn’t get to go over the coming threats with you before we were forced to leave.”

“What do you mean?”

“We’re not the only ones with gifts.” Adele sighed.

Zayden shifted his eyes.

“We know that, remember?” Darius said.

Adele looked surprised. “You do?”

“We told them.” Ruby said quickly. “We thought it was important. Maybe if you didn’t spend all of your time sleeping or doing other things, you would have told Zayden.”

“Well, I don’t know what they are.” Zayden said. “So tell me now.”

Before Adele could explain, I got this sudden feeling coming towards me. My heart began to race and I found myself pulling away from Troy to the door, slamming it shut.

“What are you doing?” Adele asked.

“Ryon.”

That’s all I had to say for her to know and there was a knock at the door a second after. “Adele?”

I panicked to think he was going to come in and see them. “Don’t come in! She’s—naked!”

Adele sighed, covering her face in response to my urgency but it didn’t work. Ryon laughed outside of the door. “Yeah, Jay. Ah, I’ve seen that more than she has.”

“Well, that’s not very gentlemen like.”

“Don’t make me come in anyway, Jay.”

I quickly locked the door as another pathetic attempt to keep him out. “Ha! Can’t!” There was a long pause and I didn’t hear a response. “Ryon?” He just left?

“You know, you’re not very bright.” I was wrong. I quickly turned around and sucked in a breath. Ryon had walked through the balcony door instead, easily bypassing the locked door. That’s why I didn’t feel him. He must have gone around.

This was bad.

Adele became just as stiff as me and she moved slowly in front of Zayden to distract from his obvious Senian armor. “What are you doing here?”

“Disappointed.” Ryon answered, shifting his eyes down her body. “Though Jay is an awfully bad liar.” He walked right passed her without an eye flicker back to Zayden and went right over to the closet.

There was definitely something wrong. I slowly moved, not wanting to attract his attention towards me and I stood myself in front of Troy but I still didn’t get it. He seemed—too comfortable. He had to have noticed but unlike him, he has yet to say a thing.

“Planning on being long?” Adele asked.

“Relax. I should have done it earlier this week but it wasn’t high on my priorities.” He took a bag and a black coat out of the closet and paused in the room. “You should really think about leaving. Your father is going to be pissed even more if you wait until the last second.” He turned to the door and I couldn’t believe this was happening. I was confused.

“Wait a second.” Adele shoved a gust of wind towards the door so it shut and he couldn’t leave.

“What’s wrong with you?” Ruby asked.

“Well, surely I don’t know what you mean, Red.”

“She means, aren’t you going to say anything?” Adele asked.

“What? I’ve seen you in a dress before.”

“Not that. Something else in the room.”

“Are you feeling all right? Start the drinking a little early tonight? I think you might be hallucinating.”

No! I gasped and turned my head back to Troy, pressing my hand hard against his chest. “What?! This is just a dream?!” I didn’t want it to be. This was real. It had to be.

Ryon laughed and made the first eye glances at the Great Seni Fighters, recognizing their presence in the room and that he was just playing. Not a fun game for me. “Chill out, Jay. I see them, all right? It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal?” Adele asked, acting seriously confused about why he would say that. She still didn’t know he was in Seni then. It was clear.

“Was that not the response you were looking for? Then how’s this? Wow, I’m so in denial by my own eyes. No one could have saw this coming.” Just as quick as he gained the sudden cheer in his voice, he lost it and turned back to the door, opening it.

Adele’s eyes widened and she pushed her hand towards the door again as fast as she could. “Wait!”

Ryon sighed, standing in front of the closed door and slowly turned around. “What?”

He was looking right at Adele as she walked over but seemed almost sad when she spoke. “You knew? You knew this entire time and you just let me—how could you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters a lot!”

Ryon paused again. It was getting clear that he didn’t want to be here and he let out a long sigh. “I’ve always been a step behind you.”

Adele’s eyes widened. “Are you kidding me and you said nothing when I asked?!”

“And how exactly would that go? Your treason is never a choice topic.”

“I have my reasons.”

Ryon laughed in an amused gesture. “Yeah. I watched.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“You think I wanted to? I didn’t have a choice.”

I saw Zayden look over, his face expressing a strange curiosity. He didn’t seem to know what any of it meant and I told him. “Picking up where we left off on our interrupted conversation, Ryon’s gift is a sight. He can look into the past. He knows what we did, obviously.”

“More like a curse and let’s not recap, okay? I have somewhere better to be.”

Good. I hoped he would leave yet when he did, it seemed not all of us were prepared.

Chapter 10

Adele

I almost couldn’t believe my own ears. He knew this whole time? It didn’t seem right with the way he was acting and I just couldn’t let him leave yet.

“Wait. I want to talk to you.”

Ryon looked back and pulled his arm away from my grasp. I felt hatred in it and it was worse on his voice. “Well, I don’t. You’re not thinking like you because you’re not you. The Adele that came home a week ago is not the same Adele that left. The real Adele wouldn’t have allowed this to happen but you, the one standing before me; this mindless, muddled thing, you don’t understand what you’ve done. People will die because of this, because of you and you don’t care as long as you get what you want.”

He walked out without giving me the chance to say a thing in return and I really don’t know if I could have. He suddenly just changed in front of me. I’ve never seen Ryon so angry before, especially at me.

He thinks I’ve changed. I didn’t think I’ve changed—that much.

“Wow.” Jaylyn muttered from behind me. “We’re in huge trouble.”

“Was breaking someone’s heart on your list of things to do today?” I could see the smile on Ruby’s face by her tone but my eyes were still on the door.

I knew I had to fix this. I had to do something. “Stay here.” I walked out of the room, down the hall and took a left passed the stairs. I turned at the next right and reached the top of another set of stairs located in the main hall just as Ryon was walking through it. “Ryon, wait!”

He stopped in front of the door and turned his head up at me racing down. The look only took a second and he reached for the door like he didn’t care.

“Stop!” I was running, luckily still with bare feet or I would have tripped by now and I pushed the door closed as he was opening it so he couldn’t leave.

“What do you want from me?”

His voice was harsh and I just wanted him to know. “I didn’t plan for this. You have to know that. I still care about you.”

He laughed like I had made a joke. “No you don’t. You haven’t shown it all week and I’ve seen why.”

This only made things worse for me and my eyes started to water. “Please. Don’t take anything you saw the wrong way.”